Living the Dream

Sometimes I wish I could boldly go where no man has gone before ... but I'll probably stay in Aurora.
- Garth Algar


So I know this guy. You might know someone like him, too. He was a cowboy, a dirtleg…sometimes we thought he was just batshit crazy. This guy once bought a live lobster on a whim just to fuck with people. While wandering around St. Louis during Mardi Gras I bumped into him, his neck piled with beads, his dick hanging unencumbered from his fly. While in the wilderness, guy made a video where he blew up a squirrel. In his taped deposition, Cody Smith claimed he was just a man searching for the American Dream. And despite the fact that he was a self-titled ‘shithead,’ you couldn’t help but admire him. Cody Smith wasn’t out in the woods looking for the American Dream…he’d already found it. This guy lived the Dream.

Before we get too sentimental, you should know that the Codemeister isn’t dead or anything…in fact, rumor has it that he wheels and deals corn up in Iowa like a latter-day non-narcotic Perm Sanders. My money says he’s good at it. This guy could sell Britney Spears on rehab. Or underwear. He still comes around sometimes, not often enough, I’d argue, and once in a while you can see that he wishes he hadn’t had to leave. He’d been pretty pleased with life…he was the least worried human being I’d ever known. And he had every reason to be, because he had it all figured out.

Now our man is in Iowa and, by all accounts, he’s doing great. But I don’t know if he’s found that new dream…acquired that sense that there’s no better place to be. He will, mind you, don’t worry about that. But, then, that’s why I’m writing this…

Living the Dream…what in the hell does that mean? In 1776, Living the Dream had an awful lot to do with the preservation of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Today, unless you’re Mexican, I would argue that the Dream has evolved…it’s all pursuit.

Others might say the Dream is a smoking hot wife (or husband), 2.5 kids, a dog, and a white picket fence with a house to match. Give me eight years and I’ll take it and run, though that half kid in the wheel chair will probably slow us down…

But here is the heart of the matter: It is my contention that the Dream is not a static entity, it varies age-to-age, person-to-person. It’s achieving your own best-case scenario. For a 30-year-old, that white picket fence probably looks pretty damn good. For a five-year-old, it looks a lot like something to color on. Whatever works.

But enough about all this other crap…lets talk about me. Or, better yet, lets talk about Senioritis, that often-cited, rarely understood phenomenon that has layed claim to my life, as it has so many before. Senioritis is, as I understand it, one part laziness, two parts mid-life crisis, four parts alcohol…and then a little something extra…something perhaps no one has articulated before.

Aside: Conventional wisdom says it’s cinnamon. People love cinnamon. It should be on tables at restaurants along with salt and pepper. Anytime anyone says, "Oh This is so good. What's in it?" The answer invariably comes back, "Cinnamon". "Cinnamon". Again and again.

What was I talking about again? Oh, right, that little something extra. I’m not sure what the hell it is. But I’ll do you one better by telling you exactly what Senioritis is: It’s the last gasp to realize the Dream…that same Dream Cody Smith had, the same one I’m having, and the very same one that you should be having. And I’ll warn you…if you do have it, you probably don’t even know it yet.

Why not? I don’t know, maybe you’re inattentive…or maybe you’re just dumb…I don’t really know. But, more likely, it’s because you’re taking it for granted. And it’s not like I never did…up until this year I heard people talk about Senioritis and I usually scoffed, as if they’d just tried to tell me that Superbad was the funniest movie of all time or something (It wasn’t. Deal with it.) But let me tell you...Senioritis is real. It’s that last gasp.

I should know. Graduation is suffocating me like a gold-digging whore with a pillow does a rich old man.

Some of you, the lucky ones, will remember my freshman year. For those that hadn’t yet had the pleasure of making my acquaintance, let me set the scene: 18-year-old moderately uncorrupted small-town boy fresh out of public school makes his way to college. Upon arrival, he discovers Congress vodka, parties, and innumerable variations of equally bad life decisions. I was, quite literally, ass-drunk for the first 31 days of college. I take only the smallest amount of pride in this.

Fast-forward three years, past the life lessons and new ideas and maturity, and I’ve met all of you. And, ironically, I’ve found Congress vodka, parties, and innumerable variations of equally bad life decisions. I take great pride in this.
With all I’ve grown and all I’ve learned, why is it that I would make my senior year a near carbon copy of my inaugural collegiate campaign? I’m just Living the Dream, baby.

Since we’re in full-disclosure mode, let’s talk about my dream. Here I am, 21-years-old, living in a quasi-compound of 30-some-thousand of my peers, with comparatively no rules or responsibility. I mean, seriously, what is my biggest problem? Working at Applebee’s two days a week? Tests? Drama? Please.

I mean, really. This is the Dream. Or at least it’s my Dream. For right now. I go to class sometimes, but I just write when I’m there. I get hammered drunk a lot, make the aforementioned bad decisions, and would typically describe myself as OOC (Out of Control) if I weren’t fully aware of what I’m doing. I hang out with my friends whenever I want, go to bed at four, get up at two, and haven’t been to class on time since Adam Sandler was funny.

It’s funny, sometimes, how you realize certain things. Sometimes you stumble into them. Other times that light pops into your head. And, still other times, Steve Miles comes to visit.

To picture my father, or at least getting a rough feel for him, isn’t all that hard. Take me, add 21ish years, subtract college and add a sense of responsibility. Keep everything else the same. That’s Steve Miles. (Yeah, keep the sophomoric jokes and the fourth-grade demeanor.)

My dad, always known to me as Wayne (his middle name), is a telephone man. Or at least he was. Now he’s something along the lines of head telephone man. It’s glamorous, but he somehow manages to stay grounded. If you’ll listen to him talk long enough, you’ll soon become stone-cold certain that his greatest mistake in life was marrying my mother. While he will say this, perhaps, seven to 10 times a day, he doesn’t really mean it. If our interaction over the past 3 ½ years is any indication, Wayne’s greatest regret is not attending college. I’ll tell you how I know this.

During the aforementioned drunk-fest that was my freshman year, my father came for a visit. I don’t remember a lot about it, but one image will forever stick in my mind: One warm, sun-soaked afternoon, as Wayne and I were hoofing it back to my dorm, he elicited the sort of “Oh my” that only a 40-year-old father who had just stumbled upon 85 college girls in bikinis can elicit. Fat kids don’t get as excited about Thanksgiving as my father got that day. He never forgot that. I know, because whenever I choose to complain about girl problems, he comes back with a Maury Ballstein-esque “The shit is wrong with you, Derek,” and immediately reminds me that there are about 15,000 girls and, therefore, 15,000 pair of breasts in my general vicinity that are potentially available for my bouncing pleasure. And, before you qualify it, Wayne stands by the motto, “Fat girls need loving too.” I agree…they just don’t need it from me. But I digress…

As the days go by, Wayne continues to convince me that I’ve got it made. Just recently, he encouraged me to stick around one more year post-graduation…no need to hurry into a career. He’s living vicariously. This is one of the many reasons that I love my father. Also, once in a while, he’ll say things like “tea is good for you” (iced tea, mind you).

Sam Miles is Living the Dream. He also has Senioritis. They aren’t conflicting ideas. Rather, they’re quite logically connected. For me, college is Living the Dream, and Senioritis is that laborious, attentive, nervous crusade to exact every last drop of value out of it. You can’t get Senioritis before you’re a senior, because you aren’t about to lose anything. And so I sit on the columns and write, I booze too much and I get up too late. And let me tell you, there is nothing more reassuring than being fully convinced that it’s EXACTLY what I should be doing. Sure, I still get worried once in a while, be it about school, or girls, or graduation. But then I think about how I do whatever I want, whenever I want, with people I like. I like me, and I like life.

Conversely, there is little more nerve-wracking than seeing it slowly slip away. Right now, I’m not sure whether I have 6 months or a year and a half, or however much more left with my Dream. Probably shorter than longer. Soon enough, I’ll have to find another Dream, just like Cody Smith or my dad. When I’m 30, I’ll have a different Dream, and 40 still another.

And you know, someday I’m going to be an old man. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll have come full circle. My Dream may be to sit on the porch and play with my grandkids…or maybe just to get hammered drunk.